Microplastics are small (<5mm) fragments of plastic debris that are ubiquitous in coastal areas and in open ocean. We have investigated the occurrence and composition of microplastics in beach sediments from the micro-tidal Northwestern Mediterranean Sea. Samples were collected on two beaches (northern and southern site) of the western Gulf of Lion showing markedly different characteristics. Sampling was performed along depositional lower, mid and upper beaches and repeated after 1month. Concentrations of microplastics in the northern and southern site were highly variable, ranging from 33 to 798 and from 12 to 187 microplastics per kg of dry sediment, respectively. Highest concentrations were found at three specific locations: nearby a local river mouth, within an accretionary area and in a depositional upper beach. The spatial and temporal distribution of beached microplastics seems to be directly dependent on external forcing such as wind, swell, precipitation, outflow and river mouth proximity.

The brown alga Sargassum furcatum and three families of amphipods (Ampithoidae, Caprellidae and Hyalidae) associated to that algae were evaluated as bioindicators of petroleum hydrocarbons input into the marine environment of São Sebastião Channel, in southeastern region of Brazil. The n-alkanes pattern were mainly associated with the natural composition of the macroalgae and amphipods, although some indicatives of petroleum hydrocarbons such as unresolved complex mixture and the no predominance of odd over even n-alkanes have been observed in some samples. Total PAHs ranged from 33.4 to 2010 ng g⁻¹ dry weight with the predominance of low molecular weight PAHs, mostly of naphthalene and alkyl-naphthalenes, which also suggested petroleum input. Even in low concentration, Sargassum furcatum and amphipods species studied seems to be good indicators of the introduction of petroleum hydrocarbons.

With the use of an in situ and static method for gamma-ray measurements, levels of radioactive cesium 137 on shallow rugged reefs which lie between 37.3° N and 37.4° N, from the coastline of Fukushima to 141.06° E, at a depth of around 10 m were surveyed for the first time from May 2016 to December 2017. To confirm the contact between the detector and a surface of rock, we used a fact that potassium containing minerals are abundant and uniformly distributed in the area, and thus the strength of the photoelectric peak of natural radioactive potassium 40 is nearly constant over the area. We have found that the levels of radioactive cesium 137 varied from point to point within a range from 1 × 10⁴ Bq/m² to 6 × 10⁴ Bq/m².

Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) were analyzed in eighteen blubber samples biopsied from fin whales (Balaenoptera physalus) during the feeding season near the Antarctic Peninsula in the summer of 2013. POP content (in ng g⁻¹ lipid weight) ranged from 46.4 to 708 for polychlorinated biphenyls (∑PCBs), 6.77 to 123 for hexachlorobenzene (HCB), 10.1 to 489 for dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane and derivatives (∑DDTs), 5.38 to 52.8 for hexachlorocyclohexanes (∑HCH) and <0.40 to 2.54 for polybrominated diphenyl ethers (∑PBDEs). The presence of those compounds in Southern Ocean fin whales is related to long-range transport and their diet based mainly on euphausiids (krill). Their contents were much lower compared to the same species in other locations, especially in the Northern Hemisphere, presumably due to differences in trophic position and the proximity of POP sources and contamination of prey items.

The extent of the Earth’s surface burned annually by fires is affected by a number of drivers, including but not limited to climate. Other important drivers include the amount and type of vegetation (fuel) available and human impacts, including fire suppression, ignition, and conversion of burnable land to crops. Prior to the evolution of hominids, area burned was dictated by climate via direct influences on vegetation, aridity, and lightning. In the future, warming will be accompanied by changes in distribution, frequency, intensity, and timing of precipitation that may promote or suppress fire activity depending on location. Where area burned increases, fire may become self-regulating by reducing fuel availability. The effects of climate change on fire regimes will be strongly modulated by humans in many areas. Here, we use a systems approach to outline major drivers of changes in area burned. Due to the array of interacting drivers working in concert with climate’s influence on burned area, and uncertainty in the direction and magnitude of changes in these drivers, there is very high uncertainty for much of the globe regarding how fire activity and accompanying smoke emissions will change in the coming decades.

In order to estimate the possible effects of existing ballast tank sediment management routine in ports the respective legal framework from different states was examined and the operational modes of selected Adriatic shipyards was analysed. The goal was to determine if the States' administration and ports' management are aware of risks which sediments pose to human health and environment due to possible presence of harmful aquatic organisms and pathogens (HAOP) or high concentrations of heavy metals. The analysis revealed that sediments from ballast tanks after being collected, are subject to the same handling procedure as any other waste material generated during ships' repair and maintenance. In addition, measures preventing sediment drainage into the sea or procedures for analyzing the presence of heavy metals or toxics have not been identified. The paper proposes the procedures ensuring the more advanced level of protection from HAOP and potentially toxic substances from ballast sediment.

Active acoustic sensors are widely used in oceanographic and environmental studies. Although many have nominal operating frequencies above the range of marine mammal hearing, they can produce out-of-band sound that may be audible to marine mammals. Acoustic emissions from four active acoustic transducers were characterized and compared to marine mammal hearing thresholds. All four transducers had nominal operating frequencies above the reported upper limit of marine mammal hearing, but produced measurable sound below 160 kHz. A spatial map of the acoustic emissions of each sonar is used to evaluate potential effects on marine mammal hearing when the transducer is continuously operated from a stationary platform. Based on the cumulative sound exposure level metric, the acoustic emissions from the transducers are unlikely to cause temporary threshold shifts in marine mammals, but could affect animal behavior. The extent of audibility is estimated to be, at most, on the order of 100 m.

This is the first study on polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in fish from the Cau Hai lagoon, a part of the largest coastal lagoon in Southeast Asia. Seven selected PCB congeners and organochlorine pesticides in sediments and edible fish tissues were quantified by GC–MS. The sum of ICES-7 PCB and DDTs concentrations in fish species consumed regularly and of economic value were in ranges 26–43 ng g−1 lw and 182–277 ng g−1 lw, respectively. The ratio between the parent DDT compound and the sum of metabolites, DDE and DDD, was most of the time smaller than 1, suggesting primarily an historical contamination of the lagoon. An agglomerative hierarchical clustering indicates sites located in the north-western part of the Cau Hai lagoon were characterized by above-average concentrations of DDE and DDT. Comparing to previous data, a large decrease in ∑DDT residues can be seen over the past 20 years.

Concentrations of organochlorine pesticides (OCPs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) were determined in surface sediment from five estuaries of central coasts of Vietnam to understand the spatial distributions and seasonal variations. The contamination pattern was in the order: PCBs (9.72–3730 ng g⁻¹ dry wt.) > PBDEs (11.8–311 ng g⁻¹ dry wt.) > DDTs (0.462–26.7 ng g⁻¹ dry wt.) > HCHs (0.491–22.6 ng g⁻¹ dry wt.) > endosulfan compounds (0.196–19.4 ng g⁻¹ dry wt.). DDTs and HCHs showed a little geographical variation, whereas PCBs and PBDEs exhibited clearer spatial distribution trend. Elevated concentrations of PCBs and PBDEs were detected in some sites in Nghe An and Quang Binh Province, which could be related to the human activities such as tourism, transportation, and domestic consumption. Seasonal variations of DDTs and HCHs were observed, showing higher residues in rainy seasons.